new to recording

[Greg_L]

greg here. pretty new to home recording and i want to get some feedback from people that know what theyre doing. im using a tascam us122/cubase LE. the room im playing in is far from ideal, but its the best i can do right now. heres a few examples:

my own composition. an old-school surf piece i call "hammerhead"

a ramones classic - "psychotherapy"

KISS/ace frehley's "rocket ride"

any comments/suggestion/critiques are appreciated.

 

[Greg_L]

damn, 10 views already and nobody has anything to say?

 

[Greg_L]

anyone?

 

[jndietz]

Personally, I think the first two sound great. Especially since you say you haven't been in "the game" that long! I think the drums sound great. Especially in that surf piece that you WROTE. That says a lot. You wrote and recorded that. I love it! Mixing-wise I think its very well done. I am sure that other people could say something constructive about it, but everyone has their own opinion on how a mix should should.

Were these tracks mastered? They don't SOUND like they were...

But, all in all, very well done. I really love the first two

(I haven't listened to the third KISS song, yet!)

After listening to the KISS song...

I am not sure what is going on here--but the drums sound a little "dead" after paying more close attention to the mixes above. I think you need to play with the EQ on your kick and your toms to liven up the sound a bit. I usually boost the midrange on the kick and toms to give them that "thwap" sound. You can add a little more low frequency boost to the toms to give them that "boom" sound. Otherwise vocals and guitar sound great. The guitar sounds "vintage" to me, I love it!

 

[Greg_L]

wow. thank you very much.

the KISS song was done a while ago while i was experimenting with mic placement and settings. i hate the drum sound in that song. i plan on just re-recording the whole drum track.

as for 'mastering', i dont even really know what that is. i just mixed them and saved what i thought was the finished product. id like them to sound louder without actually being louder - if that makes any sense. im looking for that 'big' sound that you get with more commercial products. overall, i like what im getting out of my recordings, but they all seem to lack that big sound and seperation that id like to have. i want big drum and guitar sounds at regular volume. to me, my stuff sounds 2-dimensional. i want it to fill my head, and it isnt.

anyone else have any suggestions?

 

[jndietz]

wow. thank you very much.

the KISS song was done a while ago while i was experimenting with mic placement and settings. i hate the drum sound in that song. i plan on just re-recording the whole drum track.

as for 'mastering', i dont even really know what that is. i just mixed them and saved what i thought was the finished product. id like them to sound louder without actually being louder - if that makes any sense. im looking for that 'big' sound that you get with more commercial products. overall, i like what im getting out of my recordings, but they all seem to lack that big sound and seperation that id like to have. i want big drum and guitar sounds at regular volume. to me, my stuff sounds 2-dimensional. i want it to fill my head, and it isnt.

anyone else have any suggestions?

That "loud" aspect that you are talking about is usually done in the mastering process. I'm not going to try to sound like I know what I'm talking about because I am by no means a "good" mastering-person, and if Southside Glen or Massive Mastering happen to come in this thread, hopefully they will be able to explain what mastering is all about. But, this is my explanation of it:

Mastering is the stage in recording between mixing and the final product. The levels in the song are equalized. And compression and limiting is added to bring it up to that "commercial loudness" and balancing out the overall dynamics of the song. Also any excess noise is cleaned up. And you must remember that no amount of mastering can fix a bad mix.

 

[Greg_L]

That "loud" aspect that you are talking about is usually done in the mastering process. I'm not going to try to sound like I know what I'm talking about because I am by no means a "good" mastering-person, and if Southside Glen or Massive Mastering happen to come in this thread, hopefully they will be able to explain what mastering is all about. But, this is my explanation of it:

Mastering is the stage in recording between mixing and the final product. The levels in the song are equalized. And compression and limiting is added to bring it up to that "commercial loudness" and balancing out the overall dynamics of the song. Also any excess noise is cleaned up. And you must remember that no amount of mastering can fix a bad mix.

okay, i underdstand that. now i just need to figure out how to do it.

do i combine everything into one track and play with it from there?

 

[jndietz]

okay, i underdstand that. now i just need to figure out how to do it.

do i combine everything into one track and play with it from there?

Essentially, yes! Downmix it into one track and then master from there. However, I know that in my favorite program--Adobe Audition--I can play with a mix and add my compression and limiting without having to downmix it all into a file. Which means I can master while I mix and adjust my mastering accordingly. If you have a similar application, mix down your song, and then load it into the application and add a multiband compressor and some hard limiting to it. I set my hard limiter to -.1dBFS. And then adjust the compressor to what I see fit. Compressors can pair as limiters too (I believe)--but using them solely as limiters isn't really a widely accepted practice (correct me if I'm wrong, someone, please).

 

[Greg_L]

Essentially, yes! Downmix it into one track and then master from there. However, I know that in my favorite program--Adobe Audition--I can play with a mix and add my compression and limiting without having to downmix it all into a file. Which means I can master while I mix and adjust my mastering accordingly. If you have a similar application, mix down your song, and then load it into the application and add a multiband compressor and some hard limiting to it. I set my hard limiter to -.1dBFS. And then adjust the compressor to what I see fit. Compressors can pair as limiters too (I believe)--but using them solely as limiters isn't really a widely accepted practice (correct me if I'm wrong, someone, please).

wow. thank you for your time and help, but you might as well have written that in chinese. i dont know anything about what you just said.

 

[jndietz]

wow. thank you for your time and help, but you might as well have written that in chinese. i dont know anything about what you just said.

If you get the chance, get something that Southside Glen put together that is called:

Compression Uncompressed

Above link will download a guide that he put together that will help explain what compression is and more importantly, when to use it and how to use it.

From Google, here is the definition of compression:

Compression is a subtle effect primarily for electric guitar where the highest and lowest points of the sound wave are "limited". This boosts the volume of softer picked notes, while capping the louder ones, giving a more even level of volume. This is frequently used in country music, where fast clean passages can sound uneven unless artificially "squashed".

From Wikipedia, here is the definition of limiting:

Limiting can refer to non-linear clipping, in which a signal is passed through normally but "sheared off" when it would normally exceed a certain threshold. It can also refer to a type of variable-gain audio level compression, in which the gain of an amplifier is changed very quickly to prevent the signal from going over a certain amplitude.

 

[Greg_L]

man, thanks a lot. ive got a ton of learning to do. i thought i was doing good just getting it to sound like a song. i had no idea there was this much to it. i just want my music to sound good.

 

[ido1957]

Well Greg L you sound like you've been doing this for a while....musically and recording wise.

Hammerhead is one of the better recordings I've heard on this board.
Excellent Surf Tune! Overall great playing, recording and mixing - no problems.

As mentioned above someone else might come up with something they would change but I think you have this recording and playing thing down pretty well.

Only problem I have is that your download took forever - not sure why the transfer rate from your site is so low....a few of us have ADD so they might give up before they get a chance to listen - ah instant gratification generation!

As far as mastering goes, I would recommend a mastering engineer - Massive Mastering for example comes highly recommended. There are several others like Mastering House (sorry, I forget them all). They are members of this BBS too. Although you could master this yourself for the experience, the best results would come from a pro. Your work deserves a pro in my opinion.

Looking forward to hearing some more of these great originals Greg......

 

[Greg_L]

Well Greg L you sound like you've been doing this for a while....musically and recording wise.

Hammerhead is one of the better recordings I've heard on this board.
Excellent Surf Tune! Overall great playing, recording and mixing - no problems.

As mentioned above someone else might come up with something they would change but I think you have this recording and playing thing down pretty well.

Only problem I have is that your download took forever - not sure why the transfer rate from your site is so low....a few of us have ADD so they might give up before they get a chance to listen - ah instant gratification generation!

As far as mastering goes, I would recommend a mastering engineer - Massive Mastering for example comes highly recommended. There are several others like Mastering House (sorry, I forget them all). They are members of this BBS too. Although you could master this yourself for the experience, the best results would come from a pro. Your work deserves a pro in my opinion.

Looking forward to hearing some more of these great originals Greg......

wow, thats awesome. thank you for the compliments. i dont know why theyd DL slowly for you. theyre hosted at filelodge which is usually pretty quick for me.

im glad you liked 'hammerhead'. im pretty proud of it myself. thanks again for the input.

 

[SnakeDog5050]

Listened to Hammerhead, sounds awesome man! Love the guitar tone and playing. Mixwise sounds great on my system, everything has a great surf vibe. Really nothing to add IMO, sounds just right to my ears.

 

[Greg_L]

Listened to Hammerhead, sounds awesome man! Love the guitar tone and playing. Mixwise sounds great on my system, everything has a great surf vibe. Really nothing to add IMO, sounds just right to my ears.

thanks a lot.